


A Window to the Future

by helsinkibaby



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Het, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-09
Updated: 2012-12-09
Packaged: 2017-11-20 17:50:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/588095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helsinkibaby/pseuds/helsinkibaby
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Molly's past makes Greg see something else.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Window to the Future

"Bugger!"

The exclamation, followed by a few choice words that would have had Greg's mum offering to wash his mouth out with soap, as well as the crash that preceded it, have Greg moving at some speed towards the bedroom of the tiny flat, more than a little worried about what he might find there. "Moll?" he calls as he walks. "Moll, you ok?"

When he gets to the bedroom, he sees Molly standing beside the wardrobe, mercifully in one piece, rubbing her forehead, frowning at a biscuit tin lying upside down on the floor, its lid a couple of feet away. "I'm fine," she says, sounding distinctly annoyed. "Just knocked down this bloody thing trying to get my hat down." She rubs her forehead again and Greg steps towards her, takes her head in his hand and turns it towards the light. 

"You'll live," he decides, leaning forward to brush his lips over the red spot forming. "I'll kiss you better."

He expects her to say something about how she's the doctor, not him, but she just closes her eyes and smiles. "Thank you," she murmurs, cheeks turning as red as her forehead. "Stupid place to put it..."

"What's a biscuit tin doing in your wardrobe anyway?" Greg wonders. "You get peckish in the middle of the night?" Not something he's noticed, but then he's not here every night, much as he'd like to be. The answer lies, he discovers quickly as he kneels down, in the mess of photographs that are now scattered all over her bedroom floor. The first one he puts his hand to is of a man holding a tiny baby festooned in pink; the man is the younger version of the man who is smiling at Molly proud as Punch in the graduation picture that Molly has displayed in her sitting room. Greg doesn't have to be a detective to jump to the obvious conclusion. "Is this you?"

Molly's cheeks are scarlet as she nods. "Mum gave them to me after Dad died... he never was one for photo albums or anything like that, way too organised for him. He filed his life in biscuit tins... there's a million more of them at home."

Greg's eyes light up as he makes himself comfortable on the floor, starts flicking through the photos, putting them carefully into the box. "You were adorable," he decides, and Molly grins, sits down beside him and starts pointing out the different people in each photo, some long dead, some he's only heard of, some he's actually met. None of the photos change his mind from his first impression, but his favourite is a picture of Molly on her own, pigtails in her hair, a gap-toothed smile on her face, the ends of a skipping rope in each hand.

"My sixth birthday," she tells him. "A skipping rope was the only thing I wanted... Julie McGregor sat beside me in school and she had one that she never let me use..."

"That bitch..."

"And I so wanted one of my own so that I could learn to skip... Dad stayed out with me for ages til I got it right, even got Mum to agree to delay tea, which she never did..." 

Molly is years in the past, but Greg's not. His mind flies years ahead, into the future, to picture a girl who looks very much like Molly, with hair maybe a little lighter, with his eyes. He can picture their daughter suddenly, as clear as if she was standing in front of them, and even though they haven't been together all that long, even though he's recently divorced and should be very gun shy about any new relationship, he finds he likes the idea very much indeed.


End file.
